A great gift...

My Aunt Marilyn decided to offer us a week of her time share to use for this year. She has offered it to us before, and we have never taken her up on it. We decided to go to Myrtle Beach. The place was amazing. We expected to walk thru the door and find a large hotel room or maybe a suite...but when we walked thru thru the door, we found a duplex instead. Unbelievable! We lived almost normally, if it is possble to live normally when you are away visiting a new place. There was a full kitchen, dining room, living room and two bedrooms each with a full bath.


I made sure to send her a thank you note expressing how much we appreciate the gift. She sends me an email saying (1) that it was the best thank you she has ever received (2) she is "going to save it forever" (3) "we're gonna do this again, right?" WOW! She's going to give us another week again? Do we take her up on it again? If we do, do we do it again this coming year? It seems like we would be taking much too much from her. It is quite a large gift. We'll have to think about it...

Both kids are now in middle school...

Wow..that was a weird feeling...both of my boys are now in middle school. I just went to the bus stop for the first day of school with both Danny and Alex are at the same stop, same bus this year. Both Alex and Danny kept checking their watches every minute or 2. I think that both of them were anxious. I hope that they do not end up too late that Danny rushes thru getting his stuff to his locker and ends up with trouble opening up his lock on the first day of school. You know...the first time it really counts if you can get it open easily. It doesn't help Danny that he can't even reach the top shelf in his locker, either, just one more thing for him (or me) to worry about. That's OK I guess 'cause he makes friends easily and can just ask anyone to reach anything for him. We tried to not put much up there. I can tell you though...I will be doing lots of locker checks on him. He is not the neatest individual.

This is gonna be an interesting year...I hope we can all survive it, and that I am able to not give in to yelling. The "sport" that I grew up with and hated and have appeared to inherite. Hopefully, I can change this...I really do HATE yelling. It just seems like it comes naturally to me. I guess you learn what you grow up with. That sucks and I'm determined to change it...

So sad...

I just found out that my old school crush, Caleb, committed suicide on Monday. I had a crush on him all thru school starting, I think, back in 1st grade. I just saw him in June for our 25th high school reunion. I even confessed to him that I had always had this crush. Caleb had always been popular, good looking and sweet. He never seemed to realize just how good looking he was, at least he never showed it. He was always friendly to me even though I wasn't exactly popular like him. I wonder what he was thinking...he had a gorgeous wife, 2 beautiful children (young children, who now have to make it without their father), a great job (not that I'm sure it was he dream job or not). But OMG, what makes people do things like that? I wonder if going to the high school reunion made things worse for him? I don't have a very "sucessful" life, but even I enjoyed going to the reunion. It didn't make me feel any worse than I did before. If anything...I think it has made me even more motivated to succeed at making my purses and yoga bags. No one that I chose to speak to put me down. Something that many people in our school might have done 25 years ago.

All I can say is OMG!!!

When does school start?

How many more days until school starts? I need to go and count...the boys (especially Danny) are driving me nuts...

6 more days...or 3 more days without Peter to keep "the calm". Danny believes that all day every day should be about fun. He is going to be in for a rude awakening when school starts. He will need to get all of his work done before any playing happens. The sooner he gets his work done the sooner he will get to play...so sit down and do your homework now and not later. I can see this is going to be a big problem. I'm trying to not let it get to me but the anticipation is already getting to me. His attitude today did not prove anything else to me but the impending doom...I wish I was a much more laid back person than I am, but with my genes, that was never gonna happen...

Alex just came in and asked what to do with something. All he did was argue with me.

I'm falling apart here...I can't hold it together without getting annoyed anymore. I need to have one of my children do something...anything...the FIRST time I say it. That is something that NEVER happens in my house and I am trying to figure out how to get it to happen, BEFORE I lose my mind.

It's a pity I don't like taking baths...or I would say"Calgon...take me away..."

The fish got new life...

One day last week, when it was finally nice outside, Danny did not want to do anything but read. He said he was too tired to do anything. Pete and Alex went for a really long bike ride and I got stuck at home with the lump.

So I decided to do a project that had been waiting for me since last summer. Paint my resin garden fish. He was all chipped and originally all gray, and now he kind of looks like "The Rainbow Fish". I have have him living far back in the back yard, near the bird feeder. I just discovered that you can even see it from the sidewalk, he's so bright. He's different...that's OK...I had fun painting him, even if he is funny looking, I like him...

I need to be able to to close my closet door...

I soooo want to be able to close my closet door! However, I have a stack of clothes to create with sitting on the floor in front of the door. I know exactly what I want to do with most of the pieces, I just do not have any space in my sewing/computer room to do it. I am determined to get everything cleaned up and organized. If I can manage to get everything in my "study" off the floor and in my closets then I will reward myself with a sewing table, which will then make creating much easier. I plan on documenting all of this on my blog so that hopefully if people are watching me, it will keep me on task for the pure embarrassment of it all, you know...kind of like those shows on TLC and HGTV that embarass the homeowner into fixing their messes. I would never say that my house is ever that bad but it will hopefully give me a start.

The order of things will be this:

(1) Clean out bedroom closet to make room for clothes from the study closet. This will entail purging, with hopefully some selling of old clothes, whether at consignment or on craigslist, I'll have to decide when I see what clothes are "going away". Hey...a few extra bucks can only help, 'cause the table I was looking at cost $130.

(2) Starting a new shop with destash things from my closet and other supplies. It's a pitty I gave away a lot of my old craft supplies, I could have made a few extra bucks to help my room.

(3) Finally moving my Jeans and a Sweater stuff into the closet.

(4) Buying a sewing table that will then allow me to start wanting to sew regularly for Jeans and a Sweater, which is the whole point of all of this. Well, that and making my husband happy, not that he complains, but I know that he'll love this.

I've been wanting to do this for a while. I know my husband will appreciate it, he is a neat freak and my little messes drive him nuts. Hey...he got the neat one in my family...you should see my mother and my brother (my sister has a little of the clutter gene too, not any worse than me though)...they both belong on "Clean House" (from Style Network, I love that show!). If they lived in LA, I would nominate them both and they would probably make the cut.

Now that school is started and I'm all alone at home...here it goes...

it's been a long time...

I know...It's been a really long time since I posted last. I've been trying to get ready to go on our first family trip to the beach...Myrtle Beach. Well be leaving on thursday. We're driving and I'm not looking forward to Danny's..."Are we there yet?" over and over again. I'll try to get more posts on after we come home, but it will then be time to get ready for school. Once the boys are in school everything will be easier.